Many companies package items and/or groups of items together for a variety of purposes, such as e-commerce and mail-order companies that package items (e.g., books, CDs, apparel, food, etc.) to be shipped to fulfill orders from users. Retailers, wholesalers, and other product distributors (which may collectively be referred to as distributors) typically maintain an inventory of various items that may be ordered by clients or users. This inventory may be maintained and processed at a materials handling facility which may include, but is not limited to, one or more of: warehouses, distribution centers, cross-docking facilities, order fulfillment facilities, packaging facilities, shipping facilities, or other facilities or combinations of facilities for performing one or more functions of material (inventory) handling.
Currently, items must be placed in shipping packages (e.g., corrugated boxes) and shipped to the user. Shipping packages are typically necessary to protect the items from damage during shipping. As part of the operation of packing items in a shipping package, an agent may select from a limited number of available shipping packages based on a visual assessment of the item or items once they are picked from inventory and/or grouped. This visual method of selecting shipping packages may be prone to human error, as an agent may select a shipping package that is too small, larger than needed to handle the item or items, or that does not adequately protect the contents of the shipping package. This may result in higher costs associated with using an inappropriate shipping package or result in additional costs associated with re-work—in the case that an agent must re-package the item(s) or use multiple shipping packages. Shipping an item or a group of items in a shipping package that is larger than necessary may result in unnecessary fulfillment costs. Shipping an item or group of items in a shipping package also results in the customer receiving, not only the ordered items but the shipping package that contained the items and the dunnage added to secure the items.
While implementations are described herein by way of example, those skilled in the art will recognize that the implementations are not limited to the examples or drawings described. It should be understood that the drawings and detailed description thereto are not intended to limit implementations to the particular form disclosed, but on the contrary, the intention is to cover all modifications, equivalents and alternatives falling within the spirit and scope as defined by the appended claims. The headings used herein are for organizational purposes only and are not meant to be used to limit the scope of the description or the claims. As used throughout this application, the word “may” is used in a permissive sense (i.e., meaning having the potential to), rather than the mandatory sense (i.e., meaning must). Similarly, the words “include”, “including”, and “includes” mean including, but not limited to.